Preparing Students for the Genetics Frontier

When David Matthes teaches genetics to college freshmen using personal genomics, he sets his sights beyond effective instruction and beyond his classroom walls. He is trying to increase awareness and knowledge in a deeper way that prepares his students to actively engage in the “post genome” world.

“I love the idea that these students would go out and become those ‘genome information facilitators’ that I see a need for in the future, as more and more genetic data starts becoming available,” said Dr. Matthes, an assistant professor in the Biology Program and the Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Development at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. “I want people to feel comfortable with it themselves as they get this increasingly elaborate data, and to be positioned to be that kind of helper.”

He has taught a bioinformatics class going back to 1997, but he had a realization that a different approach was needed to match what was taking place in science and research.

“I feel particularly lucky to be alive at this time when the genome is opened up. This is like a new frontier has been opened,” Dr. Matthes said. “But we’ve come to a time where education hasn’t caught up to the technology, and we needed to address that.”

Dr. Matthes is doing his part to move education into this new frontier — by utilizing 23andMe personal genetic reports with different student populations and in different educational settings. He has incorporated 23andMe into a small freshman seminar and a continuing education class for senior citizens (“they are just fascinated by ancestry!”). And soon he’ll be scaling up the freshman course through a more collaborative teaching approach.

Preparing Students for the 23andMe Journey

In the personal genomics classes Dr. Matthes teaches, each student — whether college freshmen or lifelong learners in the continuing education class — works with his or her own personal 23andMe reports. That, he said, is where the buy-in and engagement really come. “It really changes the whole dynamic of the class.”

For his small freshman seminar, Dr. Matthes made sure his students were well aware of what will be going on in the class, right from the time they register. He provided an overview of the class and its activities, and he asked that they review the 23andMe terms of use and privacy statement.

“They are briefed for the journey,” Dr. Matthes said. “I want them to know — not the first day of class but before they even order the kit — what they’re getting into. They need to know that it’s not going to be terribly scary, but I do give them a summary of the kinds of unintended things that could be reasonably, commonly seen.”

Dr. Matthes is “scaling up” the course for the upcoming semester, in line with his university’s “Active Learning” classroom approach. Rather than a lecture-hall set up, this will involve students sitting at round tables, with access to technology, tools and resources to interact with the whole class and more closely collaborate with their peers.

“My freshman seminar was my way to prove to myself that I could take anybody — who didn’t have a biology background — and help them experience the joys of genome exploration,” Dr. Matthes said. “The larger class will be students who have had some genetics, cell biology and biochemistry. They are going to be better positioned to have conversations about technical aspects of the process and the deeper implications of genetic phenomena.”

His specific favorite activity using 23andMe results involves what he likes to call the “minor ancestors” — those small percentages of ancestry that show up in people’s results — to teach about ancestral markers. Dr. Matthes has his students calculate a range of dates in his or her family history when a person with 100% of that ancestry would have had to come into the student’s family, in order to end up contributing the current percentage shown in the 23andMe results.

“It’s a ballpark, back-of-the-envelope calculation,” Dr. Matthes admitted. “But I present it as, this is one of your family secrets that your DNA has helped you to know. It was lost to the lore of the family. Maybe conveniently lost! But now we can find out that they were there.”

When he’s not teaching personal genomics or his other courses, Dr. Matthes often finds himself presenting about his genome classes or inviting other colleagues to try out this approach. He recently helped design a class with a genetics counselor where the first half of the class utilized 23andMe SNP data, and the second half looked at whole genome sequence data.

In this “post genome” age, he said, the rapid transformation of the technology to something easy and accessible is well underway.

“What a lucky time to be teaching the kinds of courses I teach,” Dr. Matthes said. “A lot of my colleagues are not thinking about it, but I think before long every university and every college in this country will be doing it.”

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13.3 Basis of the Bargain. YOU ACKNOWLEDGE AND AGREE THAT 23ANDME HAS OFFERED THE EDUCATION SITE AND ENTERED INTO THE TERMS IN RELIANCE UPON THE DISCLAIMERS AND THE LIMITATIONS OF LIABILITY SET FORTH HEREIN, THAT THE DISCLAIMERS AND THE LIMITATIONS OF LIABILITY SET FORTH HEREIN REFLECT A REASONABLE AND FAIR ALLOCATION OF RISK BETWEEN YOU AND 23ANDME, AND THAT THE DISCLAIMERS AND THE LIMITATIONS OF LIABILITY SET FORTH HEREIN FORM AN ESSENTIAL BASIS OF THE BARGAIN BETWEEN YOU AND 23ANDME. 23ANDME WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO PROVIDE THE EDUCATION SITE TO YOU ON AN ECONOMICALLY REASONABLE BASIS WITHOUT THESE LIMITATIONS.

14. Miscellaneous.14.1 Notice. Notices to You may be made via either email or regular mail. 23andMe may also provide notices of changes to the Terms of Use or other matters by displaying notices or links to notices to You generally on or through the Education Site.

Official notices related to this 23andMe Education Site Terms of Use must be sent to us at:
23andMe, Inc.
Education Site
ATTN: Chief Legal and Regulatory Officer
899 West Evelyn Ave.
Mountain View, CA 94041

Additionally, 23andMe accepts service of process at this address. Any notices that you provide without compliance with this section on Notices shall have no legal effect.

14.2 Waiver. The failure of 23andMe to exercise or enforce any right or provision of the Terms of Use shall not constitute a waiver of such right or provision. If any provision of the Terms of Use is found by a court of competent jurisdiction to be invalid, the parties nevertheless agree that the court should endeavor to give effect to the parties' intentions as reflected in the provision, and the other provisions of the Terms of Use remain in full force and effect.

14.3 Governing Law. The Terms will be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of California, without giving effect to any principles of conflicts of law. You agree that any action at law or in equity arising out of or relating to the Terms or 23andMe will be filed only in the state or federal courts in and for Santa Clara County, California, and each of You and 23andMe hereby consent and submit to the personal and exclusive jurisdiction of such courts for the purposes of litigating any such action. Notwithstanding this, 23andMe shall still be allowed to apply for injunctive or other equitable relief to protect or enforce its intellectual property rights in any court of competent jurisdiction. YOU AND 23ANDME AGREE THAT ANY CAUSE OF ACTION ARISING OUT OF OR RELATED TO THE EDUCATION SITE MUST COMMENCE WITHIN ONE (1) YEAR AFTER THE CAUSE OF ACTION ARISES. OTHERWISE, SUCH CAUSE OF ACTION IS PERMANENTLY BARRED.

14.4 Severability. If any provision of the Terms of Use is held to be unlawful, void, or for any reason unenforceable, then that provision will be limited or eliminated from the Terms of Use to the minimum extent necessary and will not affect the validity and enforceability of any remaining provisions.

14.5 Assignment. You may not assign or delegate any rights or obligations under the terms of Use. Any purported assignment and delegation shall be ineffective. We may freely assign or delegate all rights and obligations under the Terms of Use, fully or partially without notice to You. We may also substitute, by way of unilateral novation, effective upon notice to you, 23andMe for any third party that assumes our rights and obligations under these Terms of Use.

14.6 Survival. Upon termination of the Terms of Use, any provision which, by its nature or express terms should survive, will survive such termination or expiration, including, but not limited to, Sections 1.5, 4 through 6, and 8 through 14.

14.7 Headings. The heading references herein are for convenience purposes only, do not constitute a part of the Terms of Use, and will not be deemed to limit or affect any of the provisions hereof.

14.8 Entire Agreement. The Terms of Use constitute the entire agreement between You and 23andMe and govern your use of the Education Site, superseding any prior agreements between you and 23andMe on this subject.

14.9 Disclosures. This Education Site is hosted in the United States, and the services provided hereunder are offered by 23andMe, Inc.